Nationals day! Championship o’clock! Whatnot! A mere 2 hours until we get to start prognosticating about how these rosters will change next season.
Oklahoma starts on vault, Florida on beam, Utah on floor, and LSU on bars (in the live blog on Thursday, I was looking at the wrong session draw assignments).
In the warmup period, Trinity got up and did a little bit of beam in the 8th spot, after the Thursday lineup and Nguyen did their sets. She didn’t do a full hit routine, but she also didn’t do that on vault before competing in the semifinal, so who knows at this point. Also the Oklahoma mat movers completely ate it trying to put the mat in place for Dunn’s dismount. A real shame you can’t GIF real life.
So, the LSU intro video definitely destroys the earth at the end. Biggest talking point is another year with 2 of the four teams in white leos. Yeah, there’s not a lot to say so far.
Rotation 1
Blakely – BB – Florida – aerial to bhs is strong – swtitch to switch 1/2 to beat, feet in switch 1/2, solid landing – gainer full, stuck. Good start.
Sievers – VT – Oklahoma – nearly holds the stick, step forward in the end
Jeffrey had a little arch on her first hs on bars, deep on her FTDT, not as much as day 1, but a step back. Brenner a little bouncy on her first pass on floor, a bit crooked on popa but fine. Controlled step on final pass.
Stern, small hop forward on y1.5, following 9.8625 for Sievers. Seeing plenty of 9.900s for Stern. Cowan step back on DLO on bars.
9.8375 for Jeffrey. 9.900 for Blakely.
Levassuer – VT – OU – larger pace forward on her Y1.5, not sticking yet…
Lazzari falls on her bhs loso loso series. Big squat on dismount
Gilstrap – FX – Utah – front lay to rudi, pretty form, rebound back – switch to switch ring 1/2, nice. Clean one.
Bowers – VT – OU – Y1.5, smaller step forward.
Tatum holds the stick on her FTDT on bars with a stagger. Was shy on the first handstand.
Bowers goes 9.900 with the step. Torrez comes into the vault lineup and finds a stick on her y1.5, deep landing to absorb it. But if they were already happy to go 9.900 for all these steps…
DiCello – BB – Florida – hits candle mount – wolf double, hit – switch to split, comfortable – smooth bhs loso series hit – aerial, comfortable – gainer full stick, very good.
Finnegan large lunge forward on bars dismount.
Trautman with a near stick on her Y1.5, just a little rebound, following 9.925 from Torrez.
Paulson hits back 1.5 to front lay final pass on floor.
9.950 for Trautman takes Oklahoma to 49.5625 on vault. If they’re going over 49.5 for not their best vault rotation, it’s going to be a long day for everyone else.
Shchennikova – hits Ray to pak, feet on ray – late on 1/2 turn on low – DLO is deeper with a hop forward today.
Wong – BB – Florida – switch to split leap – bhs loso, nice – full turn, smooth – aerial to beat, lean correction – 2/1, hop back
9.800 for Shchennikova. Smith with a clean rudi to loso on floor.
Bryant – UB – LSU – hits first hs – blind to jaeger – some pike swining through to bail, gets to vertical – double front 1/2, small movement. Good.
McCusker – BB – Florida – following 9.9125 for Wong – wolf double, nice – aerial, solidly done – bhs loso, secure landing – switch to split leap, lovely obviously – gainer full, stuck. Look at you, Miss Riley.
Nguyen replaces Richards on beam. Big move. I like it. But will it pay off.
Rucker had a bit of a lean on her opening pass on floor, tried to hold the stick with ended up leaning and stepping some.
LSU went 49.3125 on bars. I’m seeing lots of 9.950s for McCusker. 9.9375 score.
Nguyen – BB – Florida – onodi to bhs, keeps moving through the combination – full turn, holds it – switch to split leap, nice – bhs 1.5, hop to the side. Florida avoids counting the fall and got super solid after it. Will be a huge rotation score.
O’Keefe a bit of a slide forward dance out on her final pass but a solid one. 9.900.
Nguyen goes 9.875 to get Florida to 49.525. O’Keefe’s 9.900 takes Utah to 49.500. So we’ve got a race, and Florida is keeping themselves in it early.
After 1:
Oklahoma 49.5625
Florida 49.525
Utah 49.500
LSU 49.3125
A test coming up for Utah as they’ll have to produce the vault landings, or at least close enough to get 9.9 with a big lunge, that can stay with OU’s bars and just floor scoring in general.
Rotation 2
Sievers – UB – OU – good first hs – maloney to pak, good legs together – hits 1/2 turn on low – FTDT, hit.
O’Keefe struggles on yfull, lands chest forward with a hop. Arenas holds the stick on her 1.5 beam dismount with a lean.
9.7375 for O’Keefe, 9.925 for Sievers.
Brenner – VT% – Utah – hits y1.5, knees, medium hop forward. And gets a 9.900
9.8875 for Nguyen on floor. Fletcher folds the stick on FTDT on bars.
Blakely – FX – Florida – back 1.5 to front lay, bounce out, a bit low on layout pass. switch ring to switch 1/2 is hit – switch ring 1/2 is good – double pike, hit, little rebound.
Hoffman lands short on Y1.5 on vault with a step back –
Trautman – UB – OU – maloney to pak, nice – 1/2 turn on low, a bit of angle – DLO, hit.
Smith lands a bit short on her Omelianchik, slide back. They’re already counting a 9.7 in this rotation.
Blakely goes 9.8625, a but high for me. Oklahoma continuing to get 50s on bars.
Rucker – VT – Utah – y 1.5, shuffle back, two little steps.
Smith with a hop back on her double pike out on bars, very nice on the bars.
I didn’t see what happened in Arenas’s beam to give her 9.475, but LSU is working against that now. Jeffrey hits her loso series.
Baumann with a step forward on final double pike on floor.
Gilstrap with a small rebound on her yfull to finish what will be a low-scoring vault rotation for Utah. Looked like a LOT of people trying VERY hard to stick and coming up short.
Bowers – UB – OU – nice hs on high – blind to jaeger, great height, a little close on catch today – hits pak – 1/2 turn on low, clean – good hs on high – FTDT, holds the stick, little lean.
Richards – FX – Florida – DLO, chest down, rebound back – switc side, overturns a little into popa – back 1.5 to front full, under control, some knees
Davis – UB – OU _ hits first hs – higgins to piked jaeger, excellent – hits hs on high – pak, lovely – 1.2 turn on low, crisp – solid hs on high – higgins to double front 1/2 out, holds the stick with a stagger.
Oklahoma just had a “thanks for coming, bitches” bars rotation.
Wong – FX – Florida – uh oh, bounces out of bounds on her piked double arabian – back 1/2 to front full is under control –
9.925 for Davis, Oklahoma gets 49.6375 on bars.
I see a range of 9.75 to 9.90 for Wong before the OOB is taken. Bryant wobbles on her front on beam, slide back on rudi.
DiCello – FX – Florida – front 2/1, leg crossing and a crossover step – switch ring to switch 1/2, good – wolf double, around – back 1.5 to front lay, lower lay, controls the landing.
Finnegan – BB – LSU – candle 1/2 mount – bhs loso loso, was a little off line, held it with a small lean – switch to split, good – full turn – aerial, gainer full, stuck.
49.425 for Florida on floor, which will establish a solid margin over Utah.
9.925 for Finnegan, puts LSU at 49.2375 on beam.
After 2:
Oklahoma 99.200
Florida 98.950
Utah 98.650
LSU 98.550
Utah drops back a fairly sizable margin after that vault rotation. Oklahoma will still need to avoid a regional final incident here. As will Florida. LSU staying close-ish through their weaker events, but a lot of work to do on floor and vault.
Rotation 3
Morgan – UB – maloney to bhardwaj, hit – a bit of angle on 1/2 turn on low – shortish final cast hs – giant full to double tuck, hop back.
Pretty solid control from wong on ro 1/2 on pike 1/2, small hop back.
Dunn – bb – OU – wobble on her bhs bhs loso, leans, bends at the hips – split to straddle 1/2, secure – gainer full, stuck.
And it’s 9.9125 for Wong.
Richards – VT – Florida – Y1.5, magically finds a landing somehow, was a short vault, came in deep but managed to hold it with a little hop.
brenner – UB – Utah – blind to jaeger, to overshoot, hit – short final cast hs poisition – DLO, little rebound.
Dunn still gets 9.850, which they’ll take for that error.
Trautman – BB – OU – bhs loso, leg-up check – cat leap to switch side is nice – kickover, another large break, leg up to horizontal that time – hits dismount.
Memories of the regional final, but they didn’t come off this time.
Blakely – VT – Florida – solid y1.5, hop forward.
Sage Thompson sticks DLO on bars.
Clean double pike from Brock on floor – bounce back tuck tuck – hits her final pass today. Good set.
Good high Y1.5 from DiCello – bounce back –
I just saw a judge go 9.900 for Trautman. How with those two big wobbles? 9.825 final.
O’Keefe – UB – Utah – maloney to pak, nice – short 1/2 turn on low – sticks her double arabian with a stagger. Good.
Thomas – VT – Florida – of course she stuck it after landing every single one she tried today short. Trinity.
Bowers sticks her 2/1 dismount with a leg crossing.
It’s a 10.000 for Trinity, which will tie the 10s record.
Nguyen – VT – Florida – pulls out the landing on her y1.5, a little short and a slide back.
Isa – Ub – Utah – hits ray – vertical on cast hs – bail, good feet positions – giant full to DLO, low but pulls out the landing, hop-salute.
9.9125 for Bowers.
Nguyen goes 9.8875 to take Florida to a big 49.575 on vault. In this.
Torrez – BB – OU – strong side aerial to loso – full turn, hit – switch to straddle jump, comfortable – 1.5 dismount, hop forward
McCallum – UB – Utah – nice maloney to pak, small hesitation in cast 1/2 on low – good hs on high, sticks FTDT, good. 9.9375
Nice double arabian landing from Finnegan on floor.
9.900 for Torrez
Davis – BB – OU – bhs loso series, nice – aerial, smooth – split ring jump is well done – 2/1, stuck with leg crossing. Strong one.
bryant – FX – LSU – good control on double front landing – front lay to rudi, good layout position – switch ring to switch 1/2 – big one.
One judge went 10 on Davis’s beam. 9.950 final.
Smith – BB – OU – bhs loso, comfortable – aerial, held securely – straddle jump 1/2 to korbut, nice – full turn, hit – bhs gainer full, short landing, hops forward to try to cover it.
Bryant goes 9.9375 to take LSU to 49.450 on floor, which will lose ground to Florida and Utah.
9.900 for Smith on beam, Oklahoma goes 49.5125 on beam, which drops a little ground back but not much.
After 3:
Oklahoma 148.7125
Florida 148.525
Utah 148.200
LSU 148.000
Florida has kept it close enough htat they can still have dreams with one of their big bars rotations. Floor isn’t always the one for Oklahoma.
Rotation 4
Arenas with a good stick on a yfull.
Davis – FX – OU – front 2/1, controls step, leg crossing – back 1.5 to front full, controls the step
Blakely sticks her double front on bars.
Shchennikova a bit short on Y1.5, pulls out landing with hop back.
I’m seeing some 9.950s for Blakely. She goes 9.925 in leadoff, compared to 9.900 for Davis, so Florida gains an early smidge.
Nguyen – UB – Florida – good first hs – maloney to pak is hit – a bit late on 1/2 turn on low bar – gets up to handstand well on high – DLO, a bit deep, finds the stick.
Smith – FX – OU – double tuck, chest up, little rebound – back 1.5 to front lay is clean, good layout shape – switch side, overturns a quarter into popa – double pike, chest down, step forward.
Finnegan step salute forward on her vault. Morgan starts Utah with 9.9125 on beam.
9.900 for Nguyen on bars.
DiCello – UB – Florida – good first hs – Ray, hit – solid vertical – pak to toe on to van leeuwen, legs together – nice hs on high – FTDT, stuck. Well now.
But Ragan Smith went 9.9125, so not much room to gain anything.
Bowers – FX – Oklahoma – front full front tuck, good – double pike, chest down, step forward to present – switch 1/2 to wolf full, lovely positions –
Nice vault from Bryant, little rebound.
9.975 for Dicello!
Thomas – UB – Florida – good first hs – maloney to pak – hits hs on low – toe on to van leeuwen – a slight hesitation up to handstnad on high – DLO, holds the stick but an arm wave and chest forward.
So we’ll end up with a three-way tie for the 10s record.
Eaker with a step back on her gainer full beam dismount.
Bowers got 9.950 on floor.
Torrez – FX – OU – DLO, bounce back – split leap full to wolf full is nice – leg up full, wonderful – front tuck through to doubel tuck, little bounce back.
Wong excellent on her pak and van leeuwen positions – DLO, stuck landing. Good one.
Isa – BB – Utah – good candle mount – bhs loso loso, secure with some feet – full turn, hit – bea tto straddle 1/4, little lean – hits gainer full.
It’s 9.925 for Torrez, 9.975 for Wong.
Fletcher – FX – OU – whip to double tuck, bounce back – front lay to front full, controls the step – switch 1/2 to popa, hit – 2.5, controls the step forward.
McCusker clean on the pak and van leeuwen, stalder with the usual elbows into a stuck double tuck.
Florida gets a massive 49.7125 to finish on 198.2375. Big day for them.
But the 9.9375 for Fletcher will clinch it for Oklahoma.
Good side aerial loso for O’Keefe. Great one.
Sievers – FX – OU – FTDT, controls the step back – front tuck through to double tuck, chest forward, another controlled stick – switch side, over into popa. Another strong hit.
O’Keefe gets a 10 on beam, with Utah en route to a massive beam total.
McCallum’s beam will finish this off – wolf triple, good – wolf double, solid – bhs loso, secure with feet positions – split jump to straddle jump 1/4, hit – gainer tuck full, chest forward, hop.
Sievers 9.950 as OU goes 198.3875.
We’re having a disagreement here in the press area whether Florida deserved to win instead of Oklahoma. It’s up for debate, but I’m being convinced over here that Florida had as many overscores as Oklahoma. Those floor landings really weren’t scored in reality in that last rotation though, and we had those high early beam scores for the errors, and the vault landings, so I might be digging in my heels on Florida here.
FINAL:
Oklahoma 198.3875
Florida 198.2375
Utah 197.9375
LSU 197.525
I was happy with how Florida came out today with those lineup decisions, definitely stepped it up. Utah came close, but ultimately those short vault landings were never going to be able to keep up.
Well, we’re starting with extremely high vault scores for so many steps. 🙄
They all have ten vaults so your comment is just whining. Watch Jordan Chiles take a step and get a 9925, crickets but you’re bitching about 9.862, 9.900 and 9,8875’s?
Dd, I understand they all have 10.0 starts, but I must have missed Chile’s vault today. Weird.
The Oklahoma hatred is just sad. I went to Nationals last year and their gymnasts were the nicest ones on the floor to my daughter who volunteered at the event. Such a great group of girl’s. The fans of some of these teams don’t realize that all of these girls work so hard. Oklahoma is just really good at preparing their squad. That should be something everyone celebrates. I don’t think the athletes would appreciate the bitterness of their fan bases.
There is no Oklahoma hatred. That is manufactured by their fan based. However, that said OU and LSU are the two teams that have benefitted the most from impossible scores this year. Oklahoma rightfully won nationals because Florida got some gifts on bars and was not strong enough on floor. But OU definitely got more of the favored scoring yesterday in compared to the other 3 teams.
No one can adequately defend Olivia Trautman’s 9.825 on beam yesterday. It is an impossible score. She had 2 very clear .1 bobbles and her dismount was also not free of error. It shouldn’t have gone more than 9.750 and anything more than 9.800 is impossible. Yet, she got a 9.825.
Oklahoma deserves to win because 9/10 times they are the best team on the floor. But we want Oklahoma to win with accurate judging.
I will also add that Trinity Thomas should not have scored a 10.00 on vault (twisting on the table) but the judges had no option to go up after Oklahoma’s rotation, again with Trautman going 9.950 for a vault that should have been 9.900. Trautman didn’t stick the vault and so with Thomas sticking hers, the judges had to award her the 10.0
Agree about Trinity twisting on the table, but when have college vault judges cared about block? Drives me crazy.
Also agree about Trautman’s beam (it was the worst score of the meet, imo), but we can at least take comfort in the fact that it didn’t count.
I was thinking the same thing!
Can’t see the landing on the vault feed. I guess landings aren’t important.
Devo, Fine I’ll use when Trinity gets a ten with a step. It doesn’t matter. When it’s Oklahoma or LSU all the Florida and UCLA fans do is complain about overscoring. Hypocrites.
Breaking News: Sports fan thinks their team is judged too harshly and teams they don’t like are judged too loosely.
OU fans need to stop being so offended by the fact that people would like to see a new team win. Americans like to cheer for the underdog and want to see sports dynasties fall (see NE Patriots, Alabama/Ohio State football, Duke basketball etc).
No, America wants to see a deserving winner. If Oklahoma deserves to win then they deserve to win. I have been a Florida fan my entire life and I don’t blame Oklahoma for winning. That’s stupid. The only people who behave that way are immature gymternet fans. People are just jealous that Oklahoma knows how to compete. I wish Florida would stop taking in Elite’s based on their name and go and find some gymnasts who know how to compete.
Way back in the day, it was Georgia everyone hated. Now Georgia fans hate Georgia.
I am not an OU fan and I find the Oklahoma hatred completely tacky. Don’t be bitter your team isn’t good enough.
This isn’t about wanting another team to win. It’s about complaining and whining about other teams being good because your team isn’t good enough. Florida fans are the most ignorant when it comes to respect for other teams.
@Jia — of course people want a deserving winner. That doesn’t diminish the idea that people generally love a good underdog story and enjoy watching dynasties fall. It’s true across all sports. No one is saying to hand the title to another team just because. They were cheering and rooting for the underdog(s) to bring a new winner in the sport.
I don’t know what you mean by blaming Oklahoma for winning. I mean they should be “blamed” because it’s technically their own doing for winning — they worked hard and hit when it mattered the most. They earned the win; thus, I guess you can say they should be “blamed” for winning. Maybe you meant something else?!?!
Lastly, fans of losing teams are often envious of winning teams. I watched the Chiefs win the Super Bowl and wished my team could compete the same way. I mean isn’t that true in a lot of areas of life? We want to better ourselves and want to hope for the best. I’m sure a lot of teams watched OU and are saying that “next year it’ll be us.”
Nice to see the Floor Exercise judges doing their jobs for once. Praying they continue this through all of the Florida routines.
Oklahoma just rocked their bar routines. Utah having many issues on Vault with lower start values. Leanne not having her best floor.:(
Florida doesn’t have trinity anchoring their Uneven bar routines. They are trusting Riley to hit up last.
Lol…I have no favorite team, I just called it like I saw it. By the way, Trinity doesn’t like being the anchor on any event. She rarely does.
They are cheating for Florida on bars . This is so ridiculous . This is what they did for UCLA a few years ago with Kyla and Katelyn on beam .I’m a Michigan fan and don’t know why I am surprised the judges are making sure Florida wins.
Once again Oklahoma over scored. Vault scores in rotation 1! They were handed the championship during Vault.
Florida is your real champions!
Do you know how ridiculous it is to say that a team was “handed the title in the first rotation?” Like there aren’t three more rotations? Good lord, what a psychotic OU hater. Logic out the window. Six judges per event keeping four scores and it’s “fixed.” How pathetic that false rhetoric is.
To LSU choked again. Don’t call me fucking psychotic! I’m here in person right by vault. It was pretty dang obvious bitch. Get over your self you narcissistic!
Especially the way Florida was scored on bars. Well said.
Congrats to OU! They are so consistent and mentally tough. I also want to shout out Dunn and Sievers who don’t get a lot of attention from this squad. As an Ohio State fan with no dog in this fight, those two have impressed me all season.
Now, NCAA it’s time to devalue 2-pass floor routines and add the auto deduction for stepping over the vault lines.
The judges tried to cheat for Florida on bars. I’m a Florida fan and I saw it. Oklahoma deserved the win. Their start values on Vault means they deserved their scoring. I love my Gators but the fans we have online need to stop giving us a bad name with their whining. If i can admit we didn’t deserve it, then you can acknowledge it too
Shut up Gator fan!
If Trinity was healthy….
Florida would have no excuse for still finishing 2nd.
What? FL they were great on bars. I’m sorry but Oklahoma was overscored on vault and some other generous scores especially for one on beam that was 9.8 range with lots of breaks. It was obvious that judges wanted them to win. They are a great team but be fair to all the athletes and teams. I think other scores for other teams were fair.
Spencer, just watch the OU and Florida beam and vault rotations and it will be clear that Florida was robbed
Absolutely blatant
Spencer, thank you so much for all of your wonderful coverage this whole season. Your blog is truly terrific and one of a kind, and truly some of the most objective coverage in sports while still keeping it fun and honest. Quad boxes and keeping track of multiple meets at once are so stressful, and you’re truly doing the most to help the fan experience and grow the sport! You’re the best 🙂 I hope you get all the free cocktails tonight!
Where is Mary? I need some positive commentary on the BBS blog.
I miss you, Mary!
Win or lose, Im so impressed by how these Gators overcame so many demons and previous post-season errors and just nailed it today. Im not sure where florida was “gifted” on bars? They were stellar in every way, from the landings and difficulty to beautiful form. Nguyen stepped up so much this entire meet, a revelation. Riley had her best night of her collegiate career. DiCello was solid on all 4, and Wong great on 3 events, her best vault of the season. Blakely recovered so well today, and Bauman had her best floor of the postseason. Trinity’s vault was the best of any gymnast all week, on an injured leg no less. The Gators have so much diversity and unique personalities, they don’t all look or act the same. They overcame so many pre-season injuries and had a phenomenal season from start to finish. It has been a pleasure following this amazing team all season. Kudos to their amazing coaches. Lastly, congrats to oklahoma and their consistency.
Florida lost. Get over it. Leanne’s form issues negates her UB score. I don’t know any Oklahoma fans that run their mouths but Florida fans are constantly saying they were robbed. Maybe if they started signing quality over Elite success at the age of 15 they would be winning.
The judges decided they don’t have Trinity so they gave crazy high scores to Riley, Leanne and Kayla. Florida lost this meet on Vault. The only reason they were in it is the Uneven Bar judges were cheating for them.
Just watch the scores from prelims to Finals and it’s obvious the judges were trying to give this to Florida.
You wanna talk a real screwing, Michigan fan here. Florida shouldn’t even have been at Nationals.
Your comments Alice are nasty and vile. Just rude and factually wrong.
I’m coming down for Florida for the reasons Spencer articulated. I do like them better than Oklahoma, though, so make of that what you will.
Highlights:
The biggest highlight was Nguyen’s vault. I can’t believe she pulled that out after what happened at Oklahoma.
Audrey Davis on bars and beam is just beautiful.
Haleigh Bryant’s vault and the entire way LSU has been so resilient this season.
The last rotation in general, but particularly Maile’s beam. I love when she hits like that.
I also loved seeing Amelie hit her best beam of the season. I’m a team GB fan and enjoy watching her.
I’m also glad Trinity tied but didn’t break the 10 record. She’s such a delight, but now we don’t have to do the whole “but she had an extra year of eligibility” shebang. I also happen to be a bitter 2020 grad.
Did not intend to send this comment as a reply
Ah, FireTheJudges has become Alice now.
Are you arguing that Michigan State deserved the spot over Florida to Nationals?!?! That seems crazy. Florida was definitely the better team in the Pitt Regional.
HA. Michigan fans are the saltiest I’ve ever seen. Always hating on Florida, too.
Florida shouldn’t have been at Nationals? Really? Where was your team? Oh that’s right, in Ann Arbor. Michigan has not brought it two post seasons in a row while Oklahoma, Florida, and Utah have dominated. I’ll never forget how badly they choked in last year’s championship. So much talk about being robbed of the number #2 seed this year because Florida was overscored, but it shouldn’t have mattered because Michigan should have been able to crush a barely healthy LSU and Denver and easily advance.
2024 National Championships way too early predictions.
Final 8: Oklahoma, Florida, Cal, Michigan, LSU, Utah, UCLA, and Ohio State
Final 4: Oklahoma, Cal, Utah, and LSU
Champion: Utah
AA: Haleigh Bryant
VT: Bryant and Brooks
UB: Wong
BB: O’keefe and Davis
FX: Harris, Bryant, Frazier
The press area? You mean the Pro Florida press? Come on Spencer. 80% of the “press area” spend their entire lives kissing the ass of the Gators on social media.
College gymnastics press consists of ex-athletes of the school’s competing.
Have you followed BBS, Gymcastic, and the gymnastics Reddit? It’s like 75% UCLA press with other big names thrown in (mainly Olympians and elites).
ESPN coverage focuses on the SEC because that’s the conference ESPN has a deal with and brings in their money. Although, Bart Connor is probably the biggest OU fan there is and his commentary during post-season should be a little more unbiased. If fox had more coverage we would get more pro-Big Ten and PAC coverage.
Next season can we just give OU a trophy and tell them to stay home so the rest of the schools can compete for a title?
Florida and Oklahoma both got gifts. I feel for the great Level 10’s who aren’t from one of the favored universities….they are the ones who are underscored all year. So sick of Olympians and other big name former elites getting gifts all year.
Stop accusing everyone of being the same person .There is a reason you were called psychotic, CC. You are the one guilty of posting under multiples names . This blog is like that obese chick Lauren from the gymternet’s Twitter before she got kicked off.
I’m glad I didn’t read any of this stuff until after a couple days calming down and rewatching the competition.
Everyone is so wrapped in that last rotation where yes, Florida was better on bars than Oklahoma was on floor, that they’re forgetting about the rest of the competition.
It did seem like the judges got more generous as the competition went on.
I believe Florida ended up getting a higher Vault score than Oklahoma (?) but aside from Trinity’s vault I don’t think any of their vaults were better than Oklahoma’s vaults.
The 4 vaults that Oklahoma didn’t stick just had a small step or hop on the landing which didn’t warrant large deductions.
After Jordan Bowers and Audrey Davis got 9.925s for near flawless bar routines(I said NEAR, don’t come at me, I thought Audrey’s was better than Jordan’s but I know she has that built-in deduction on her dismount) I found myself comparing every bar routine after that to theirs and I saw some routines from Utah and Florida that were equal to theirs or not as good as theirs outscore them.
Don’t get me wrong, Florida had a great bars rotation and deserved to have the highest team bars score(which they did).
Beam was a beast for both Florida and Oklahoma. Yes, Olivia should’ve got a sub-9.8 instead of a 9.825 but that ended up being their drop score and didn’t even count toward the team’s total whereas Florida was under pressure to drop a score that included a fall so prob had some extra nerves and weren’t at their absolute best on beam though they did end up pulling it off.
I thought floor scores were generous throughout the entire competition. Everyone seems to forget that Florida had just an ok floor rotation, they had to drop an out-of-bounds from LeAnn.
Oklahoma went into their floor rotation with the lead and basically just needed to keep all of their routines in bounds to win and they did. I think Ragan and Jordan each had a quick landing on a pass in their routines where you couldn’t tell if they were really in control or stepping forward instead of backwards, you can argue that a larger deduction should’ve been taken for each of those.
Also I’ve noticed that Spencer will say there was a hop or a slide on a landing on floor(not just for Oklahoma but for all of the teams) but when I see it on tv it looks like a secure landing *shrug*
But looking at the competition overall, Utah killed it on beam and Florida killed it on bars in that final rotation which is what’s the freshest on everyone’s minds and why some are finding the results controversial but it was too little too late. Oklahoma was pretty evenly solid on all 4 events and that’s what is needed to win.
We’re just beating a dead horse if we keep complaining about scores when we all know by now that it sucks and all of the tops teams are over scored all the time. At this event they all performed in front of the same 6 judges on each event, high and low dropped-remaining 4 averaged. It’s pointless to try to argue that they were biased toward any particular team.
I take the gymternet’s passion with a grain of salt because of course if the team you’re rooting for doesn’t win you’re going to find faults with the teams that beat them and it temporarily feels good to see others online who feel the same way that you do but it’s not healthy.
I also get rooting for the underdog and not wanting to see the same team win all the time but
“Promote what you love instead of bashing what you hate” is one of my favorite quotes.
Much of the gymternet and probably the press box that Spencer was describing tend to be biased toward Florida and UCLA because they seem to get the most superstar Elite recruits.
I’ve also seen people say those teams are “more diverse!” and “more lgbtq friendly!”
As if all of the top teams didn’t try to recruit those exact same gymnasts.
By the way, where were all those rainbows we were promised at Nationals?
The beaver on Jade’s warmup Leo appeared to be rainbow colored but I’m not sure if that was intentional or not.
UCLA, the team that said they’d be covered in rainbows, just had small rainbow tattoos on their backs- some of which were covered by their leotards.
Methinks the gymnasts themselves don’t actually care about these issues as much as their fanbases would like to think they do.
The biggest rainbows I saw were the bows in the hair of half of the Utah team during semifinals but a team like Utah would never receive credit from the gymternet for something like that.
I’ve always liked individual gymnasts from both Florida and UCLA but have never been able to root for those TEAMS probably because of how heavily favored they seem to be by the gymternet and the press.
I would’ve been happy with Utah or LSU winning and I wouldn’t have been mad if Florida won instead of Oklahoma- because you can make an argument that they deserved to- and for that reason alone.
I’ve always appreciated Spencer’s coverage because he doesn’t seem to care as much about the “feelings” stuff as Jessica would put it and just wants to see good gymnastics.
I wish we could all be more like that.
(I’m sorry this was so long but I don’t have any social media accounts and as a gym fan I sometimes just want to get my opinions out to other gym fans who would understand, thanks!)
I just saw all of Florida’s vaults so the people complaining Oklahoma was overscored are just bitter. Did you see the form on Kayla and Leanne’s vaults? The steps. The messy execution. You refuse to acknowledge the gifts given to you Elite’s.
Y’all. Criticism of blatantly incorrect scoring doesn’t mean one is a “hater” of OU or any other team. If the scoring is not credible – and their are legions of examples across multiple meets where it is not – the results are not credible either. That’s not “hating.” You know what is hating tho? Insisting that scoring that actually doesn’t adhere to the cord is is fine. It’s not. And the athletes don’t benfit from incorrect scoring.
If we’re still making arguments regarding scoring, Utah was hit harder on floor bars, and team than any other team. Grace McCallum hop on beam dropped her into the 9.8’s. Her wolf turn was the best of all of them with no leg drops or body Bends. Bars were hit hard as well as floor. Do I believe that Utah should have won. No. But the scores were closer than indicated. The scoring and commentary from the finals was extremely lopsided and biased toward Florida and Oklalhoma, and that is some thing that will probably never change. Gilstrap‘s floor routine is stunningly well performed and deserved at least 9.9. Scoring will never be equal and I don’t know how they will fix it. It was a fun and exciting meet to attend. As parity between teams increases oversight in judging needs to improve as well. Teams are no longer so obviously separated as they were a few years ago so judging needs to be more stringent and deductions need to be taken other wise this result will not change year after year.